The Siren's Silent Song
by ThunderClouds7
Summary: After Stiles saves the pirate prince, Derek Hale, from the clutches of his siren brethren, Stiles is cast out of the clan, voiceless, doomed to wander dry land on two legs until he brings the pirate back to his watery grave. Little Mermaid AU


The Siren's Silent Song

Derek Hale stood at the prow of his ship, watching the way the grey waves rose and fell and crashed against the dark hull. Behind him, his crew clamored and clattered as they went about their work, trimming the sails to get the most out of the stiff wind travelling across the ocean. Derek lifted his spyglass to his eye and scanned the horizon—the mist was rolling in at the same time they were supposed to be coming up on an outcropping of rock.

He spotted the dark shadow just before the mist swallowed it and his ship, but his crew was ready and had the lanterns up and unshuttered. "Stay on this bearing, and we'll clear the island with plenty of space!" he bellowed back to the helmsman.

"Yes, Captain!"

This was Derek's first voyage as captain of the _Silent Serpent_. He had been first mate and shadow and part of the crew and even the deck swab, but two weeks ago, his mother had finally approached him and told him that he would be leading a raid against the Golden Empire's trading fleet. Of course, she sent his uncle and her right hand, Peter, with Derek to make sure he didn't fuck up, so Derek wasn't entirely sure what to think of the honor.

Peter sidled up to him, dressed all in black but for a red sash around his waist. "Are you sure we shouldn't weigh anchor and wait for the mist to clear?"

Derek had to remind himself that he was in charge because Peter had a tendency to give suggestions that were actually just orders. "We don't have the time. We need to get past the island today is we're going to properly intercept the fleet."

Peter nodded and disappeared like a shadow into darkness.

Derek hoped to Poseidon that he was making the right decision.

The _Silent Serpent_ glided forward into the mist, the water lapping gently against the hull and the lanterns casting an eerie glow around the whole ship. The mist deadened all sound so the ship moved as if in a bubble, and Derek tried to watch for danger through his spyglass, but all he could see was a wall of white.

"Keep us on a straight line!" he yelled to the helmsman.

"I am, Captain!"

Despite their care and Derek's constant vigilance, a dark shadow loomed up out of the mist twenty yards from the port side of the ship, jagged rocks pointing up in uneven directions, a glowing stone in the center illuminating the scene with a soft green glow. A pack of five creatures lounged on beds of seaweed, scaled tails dangling into the water. The three women and two men had thick, black tattoos crawling up their bare chests, visible even from this distance, and the women's long, dark hair cascaded down their shoulders.

All five of them opened their mouths and began to sing, and it was the most beautiful sound Derek had ever heard, unearthly, haunting, echoing off the waves until the music was amplified a thousandfold, wrapped around the ship like a lover's arms.

"Wax!" Peter bellowed, the sound of his voice harsh and grating against the heavenly music coming off the island.

The boat and mist disappeared, and Derek stood on the grassy hill above his childhood home, the village he, Peter, and his mother lived in before Talia Hale took over an invading fleet of pirate ships and became the Pirate Queen. The grass was a deep green color beneath his boots, the sky overhead preparing to rain; he could see it in the heavy, grey clouds and the charge in the air. He looked down on the village. There were only seven cottages and a center lodge; smoke puffed out of all the chimneys, and he saw two small figures moving down the street.

Derek smiled. He missed this village – how quiet it was, how kind his mother was when they still lived there.

He walked down the hill towards the village and hopped the stone fence separating him from the bottom half of the hill. His feet fell for a lot longer than they should have, and suddenly, he plunged into frigid water, the shock forcing the breath from his lungs. He sank deeper and deeper into the water while he stared up at the green light on the surface like a lifeline just out of reach. He stretched out a hand to it, but the cold and the heavy water had wrapped around his limbs, preventing him from moving.

A dark form splashed down into the water and shot towards him, swimming in a sinuous line, and a pale had reached out a hand and caught him by the coat. Black spots blotted out his vision, and he was unable to lock onto any of the creature's features as it dragged him up towards green light.

Derek was thrown onto the rocks. His back cracked against a sharp stone, and he rolled like a limp doll across the island until he bumped up against a silver, scaly tail. He looked up into a blurry, bearded face.

Hard hands grabbed him by the arms and dragged him upright, water running down his face and dripping from his clothes. "This one looks tasty," a voice hissed near his ear.

"Nice and meaty," a second voice agreed. "His blood smells strong."

"My king, would you like the first taste?"

Derek shook his head to clear his vision, struggling to focus on the people around him as he was dragged to his knees before the siren king and his silver tail. He saw sharp shark's teeth descending towards his neck, but the implacable grip on his arms prevented him from twisting away.

A dark red blur flashed past Derek and slammed into the siren king, and the two of them tumbled to the side. Angry shouts filled the air, beautiful yet ear-rending at the same time, and Derek was tossed back against a rock. His two captors lunged forward, springing over one of outcroppings and splashing into the water.

Derek struggled to regain control of his limbs, wavering to his legs as he looked around for his ship. There were two sirens left on the island with him, and their black, maw-like eyes locked onto him. They came slithering towards him through the shallow, seaweed filled pool, using their powerful arms to drag themselves forward as the split fins of their tails propelled them from behind.

Derek scrambled back just a moment too late because a claw-tipped hand slapped down on his calf, got a good fistful of his baggy pantleg, and began to pull him forward. Derek kicked out with his free leg, connecting with the siren's head, but his attacker's companion caught his boot and slammed in to the ground. The two of them began to climb up his legs, undoubtedly aimed for his neck.

Derek fumbled for the saber at his hip, but it was tangled beneath him and wrapped up in his long coat. A hand seized his collar from behind and yanked on him, ripping him out from under the two sirens and dragging him off the island and into the water. The hold on him didn't loosen, and he was unable to twist around and see who had him as he was towed deeper and deeper.

His lungs burned—he'd been unable to grab a proper breath before plunging into the water a second time. Everything was black and cold. He didn't have control of his limbs. He felt when the direction of their movement switched, but he could not say in what way. Whoever had hold of him had saved him from the teeth of the sirens only to drown him beneath the waves.

Suddenly, cold air hit his skin, and sand ground against his face. Derek gasped, coughed, and shuddered, then fell, panting, whole body trembling. After a minute, he managed to drag himself to his knees. He sat on a beach of dark sand beside a stretch of forest on one side and sheer cliffs on the other.

He turned back to the ocean. One of the sirens lounged in the surf, grinning at him with sharp teeth. His dark hair stuck up in salt-gelled spikes, and his eyes were black circles within his pale face. Thick, black tattoos swirled up one arm and across his chest, and his deep red tail flopped idly in the water.

"Did you just save me?" Derek asked because he couldn't wrap his head around the idea.

"I decided you were just too pretty to let my brothers and sisters eat," the siren said, long, claw tipped fingers playing with shell necklace around his neck. He had a melodious voice, like Derek expected, and it reminded Derek of wind chimes in a steady breeze.

"Thank you," Derek said, words shaking.

The siren winked. "How else am I supposed to keep my status of the family black sheep?"

Derek snorted a laugh, surprised, but before he could say anything else, a shriek split the air, emanating all the way out from the center of the ocean, and the siren went rigid, craning his neck around to stare in the direction of the sound. "Poseidon's balls, I've got to go deal with all the shit I've just created."

"No, wait!" Derek scrambled forward on his hands and knees as the siren flipped around and began to dive back into the water. Derek snapped a hand out, trying to grab the siren's shoulder, but all he got his fingers around was the cord of the shell necklace, which broke as the siren shot away, leaving Derek kneeling in the surf with a small, blue conch shell dangling between his fingers.

Stiles swam back towards the Home Rock, his tail undulating easily through the currents. His eyes picked out every changing shade of color in the water, the colder dark blues and the lighter blue-greens, and he could see the lines of the currents as they moved. Tiny fish darted around him, playing in the little waves his movements created, and he stayed close to the surface where the water had the least amount of pull and was easiest to move through.

It didn't take long for him to reach the Home Rock where they had lured the pirate off his ship. The other humans had managed to shove wax in their ears before the siren's song could catch them. He flicked his tail for one last surge and slipped out of the deep water and into one of the shallow seaweed pools.

The the king and his hunting party waited for him with folded arms and furious expressions. King Argent glared down at Stiles, arms folded across his wiry chest, water dripping from the shell beads woven through his salt and pepper beard. The fins of his silver tail flicked irritably against the rock. His daughter, Allison, sat to his right with her best friend, Lydia beside her. On the king's other side were Kira and Scott, Stiles' closest friend since childhood.

"What the hell was that, Stiles?" King Argent demanded.

"What was what, Ye Old-ee Majesty?" Stiles asked, looking up at the king with wide, innocent eyes.

"You know what, Stilinski!" King Argent yelled. "Why did you save that human?"

"He was pretty." Stiles tried to dazzle the king with a smile, but King Argent looked like he was about to blow a gasket.

"Pretty? _Pretty?_ He was a _human_, Stiles. They're food, that's all."

Stiles shrugged. He didn't really have much of an explanation for his actions. He saw the pirate with his dark hair and stubble and the sweep of his black coat, and Stiles _had_ to save him. Had to get close to him. To touch him. Speak with him.

"I don't know what came over me, Your Watery Greatness. It won't happen again."

Scott struggled to hide his smirk behind his hand.

"No, it certainly won't happen again," King Argent said, and Stiles felt his stomach drop. "Because your banished from our clan."

The four siren hunters' eyes widened, and Allison's hand flew to her mouth. Stiles' heart thundered in his chest, and it was all he could hear as his head went light, and he forgot how to breathe.

"King Argent, no," he heard Scott say dimly. "It was one mistake. Don't—"

"Be quiet, Scott. Stiles has betrayed our clan, and for that, he is banished until he can bring back the life that he took from us."

King Argent slipped off his rock and across the pool to Stiles. Stiles didn't have enough control of his body to try and resist as the king's hand snapped out and into his neck. The king ripped Stiles' larynx from his throat with a wet squelching sound, his clenched and bloody fist glowing red, and the last thing Stiles heard before everything went back was the sound of his body hitting the water.

Stiles came to with sand grating against his skin and waves lapping around his waist. There was a raging, burning pain in his throat, a pounding in his head, and his whole body felt heavy and weighted down. He flicked his tail to try and drag himself deeper into the water, but two separate appendages flopped in opposite directions.

Stiles hoisted himself up into a sitting position to look down at his tail, and his heart stopped. He had legs, not a tail. _Fucking legs_. Pale, weird, bony legs. And feet! He had fucking feet! The things were so weird looking—each toe could be almost but not quite moved independently; one brought the others along with it, and they were all weird and round, and Stiles didn't like them. He didn't like having toes. He didn't like having feet. And he certainly didn't like having legs. He didn't even want to think about the knees. Fucking things only bent in one direction.

"Mummy, there's a man in the water."

Stiles jerked his neck around at the sound of the child's voice and saw a redheaded woman leading a young boy down the sand, each of them with baskets in their hands. The motion made his head swim, vomit threatening to flood up his throat.

The woman placed her hand in front of the child, holding him back, but she looked down the beach at him in concern. "Are you okay, mister? Do you need help?" She paused, taking a closer look at him. "Where are your clothes?"

Stiles glanced down at himself. He was as naked as a freshly born human baby.

"_I fell overboard,"_ he said. He frowned. No sound – no words came out. He tried again.

"_I fell overboard." _

Nothing.

He lifted a hand to his throat. The flesh there felt raw, hot.

"Can you speak?" the woman asked.

Stiles was forced to shake his head, and his heart plummeted at the same time. To be unable to speak, unable to use his voice…Stiles felt he should fling himself and his stupid fucking human legs into the ocean right then and there and let himself sink.

The woman, pushing the child back, took two steps forward. "Are you hurt?"

Stiles shrugged helplessly. He couldn't tell. This transformed body felt so wrong, so heavy. Tears pricked at his eyes. How the hell was he supposed to know if something was wrong?

The woman saw his expression begin to crumble. "Do you need help?"

Stiles nodded. Getting help from a human—it had to be a new low for him, but storms above, he felt like he was about to melt away.

The redhead walked towards him, unwrapping her woolen shawl from around her shoulders, and held the cloth out to him. "Here. Cover yourself with this."

Stiles took it with a trembling hand and clutched it to his chest as he tried to rise. His new knees buckled immediately, spilling him to the sand, the granules in his nose, his eyes, his mouth. "Oh my," the woman said. Her warm hand wrapped around his arm, and she helped pull him upright, holding onto him as he struggled to gain his balance. Poseidon, this was so fucking stupid.

Stiles' legs trembled, but after a long, embarrassing minute, he figured out how to stand on them without help, and the woman let go of him so that he could wrap her shawl around his waist and tie it off.

"My name is Ariel," she said. "What's yours?"

"_Stiles,"_ he said, having already forgotten that King Argent had stolen his voice.

"Right." Ariel's face folded. "You can't speak. Can you spell it out in my hand?" She held out her palm to him.

So Stiles spelled out his name letter by letter, tracing the symbols in the center of her palm with his fingertip.

"S-T-I-L-E-S. Stiles? Is that your name?"

Stiles nodded, his already aching throat tightening even further.

"Why don't you come back to my house with me and my boy?" Ariel smiled at him though Stiles watched something nervous flicker through her eyes as her gaze swept over his face. He wondered if his features had changed since he'd become human. Did she see the black eyes, the pointed teeth? Did she think them frightening? "We can get you some clothes, some food, whatever else you need."

Stiles nodded and smiled back at her, keeping his lips pressed shut just in case he still had pointy teeth.

"Come on then." Ariel jerked her head over her shoulder and started walking back towards her son.

Stiles lifted one of his feet an inch of the ground and tried to move it forward to take a step, but immediately, his legs buckled, and he crashed back to the sand. _"Fuck!"_ he screamed. Or tried to. "_Fuck!"_

"Woah, you're okay." Ariel crouched down beside him and ran her warm fingers up and down his back. "You just need a few minutes to get your land legs back. That's all."

Get his land legs back—that was fucking hilarious.

Ariel helped him back to his feet and got an arm around his shoulders to keep him upright, and together, they staggered across the beach towards her son who had been watching all of this with wide eyes. "Eric, lead the way."

The boy, Eric, nodded, turned, and scurried off the beach towards a column of smoke rising in the air. Stiles focused on his swirling black tattoos, traced the way they curled up his chest, and concentrating solely on them helped him to place one new foot in front of the other.

The beach deposited them onto a path through the trees, and Eric led the way up it, swinging his baskets in his little boy way, his steps skipping with an easy grace that Stiles envied and knew he would never attain.

After a couple of minutes, Stiles was ready to fall over. His feet were on fire, his calves screaming, both legs ready to buckle. He clung to Ariel like a newborn, stewing in his frustration and his embarrassment and his rage.

King Argent took everything from him.

"Here we are. We made it," Ariel said.

They'd broken out of the woods a minute ago, stepping onto the dirt road of a small village. The cottages were all small affairs, made out of stone and wood with tiled roofs, light trails of smoke puffing out of the chimneys. Bushes with flowers on them lined the road, and a few children bumbled by, chasing a ball and being chased in turn by indulgent parents. Eric opened the door to the house closest to the trees, disappearing inside, and Ariel helped Stiles stagger through and sit down at the kitchen table. Stiles panted, his head pounding. How the hell did humans go _anywhere_, having to walk all the time?

"I'll get you some food," Ariel said and bustled away into the kitchen.

Stiles sat at the table, trying to get used to the sensation of having two aching appendages rather than just one and to the feeling of separateness. He couldn't figure out why Ariel was being so nice to him. Sirens never helped those outside of their clan. Survival of the fittest, and all that.

Ariel returned with a tray of food – sliced fruit, steaming pasta covered in cheese and a light tomato sauce, and a tall glass of water. She set the tray on the table and slid it towards him, favoring him with another one of her smiles, and then sat down in the chair across from him.

Stiles leaned forward and eyed the food. Sirens mostly just ate raw meat and the occasional ocean plant, neither of which were particularly tasty, but they got the job done. He wasn't totally sure this cooked human food wasn't about to poison him.

Ariel laughed at his expression. "I'm not trying to drug you, I swear." She took the fork, speared a piece of pasta, and popped it in her mouth. Stiles watched her chew and swallow then took the offered fork and very carefully tried some of the pasta.

His eyes went wide as flavor exploded across his mouth. Storms above, humans knew how to do food! This was a thousand times better than raw fish or even the humans themselves. There were just so many different things all jam packed into one morsel—it didn't seem possible.

Stiles yanked the bowl towards him and dug in, bowing his head over it so the food would have less distance to travel to his mouth. He fucking loved cheese. It was his new favorite food. Stiles tried the apples next, and the flood of tart sweetness across his tongue nearly knocked him unconscious.

Within seconds, the rest of the food was gone, and then he chugged the water down, too, marveling at how clean and crisp it tasted without all the salt. Ariel laughed. "Someone was hungry."

Stiles smiled and nodded, desperate for his voice.

"I brought you this, too." She pushed a pad of paper and a pot of ink with a stylus across the table towards him, and Stiles' grin was genuine this time as he reached out to take it.

"What happened to you?" Ariel asked. She cupped one hand under her chin as she watched him.

Stiles dipped the stylus in the ink and began to scribble. His handwriting was terrible—like chickenscratch. Sirens didn't get many chances to write in the deep sea. He and Scott used to scrawl messages on bits of seaweed and then tie them to fishes and send them to each other.

He held the pad up for Ariel to read. She had to squint at it for a minute before she could decipher it. _"I fell overboard."_

"How did you lose your clothes?"

"_I was sinking. It was storming."_

Ariel watched him for such a long moment that Stiles began to squirm. She didn't believe him. That was obvious. How would she react if he told her the truth?

"The ocean can be a harsh place. I lost Eric's father to it three years ago. Sirens got him. Lured him off the ship. His crewmates said they watched with wax filled ears as the monsters bit into him with their sharpened teeth and ripped his flesh away to eat, blood flowing all across their rocky island."

As she spoke, her voice grew harder and harder, angrier and angrier, and her fist clenched atop the table as if it already had a siren throat inside of it. Stiles shifted his eyes away from hers, nausea rising up his throat.

He scribbled across his paper. _"I was being sold."_

"Oh." Ariel covered his hand with hers. "Stiles, I'm sorry."

Stiles shrugged.

"Did they do that to your throat?"

Stiles lifted his hand to his neck, wondering what it looked like.

"You're safe now," Ariel promised. "You can stay here as long as you like."

Tears pricked at Stiles' eyes. He didn't deserve this kindness. It was at least his species, if not his clan, that murdered Ariel's husband, stole Eric's father from him. Yet here she was. Offering him food. Shelter. Kindness.

How quickly that would all change if she knew the truth about him.

Ariel gave him Eric's room, telling her son he could sleep in her bed to which the boy responded with bright eyes and a gap-toothed grin. "I'll draw water for a bath if you want to wash the salt and sand off. And you look like you're about my husband's size. I've still got some of his clothes. You can wear them until we can get you something better."

Stiles wished he could say 'thank you' out loud rather than just on paper.

He helped her draw water from the well and heat it up in a big, copper tub, and she left him in the bathroom when it was all ready. Stiles stared at the steam coming off the water. Sirens didn't bathe. Obviously. What a weird concept.

Stiles poked the water with one finger, jerking his hand back when he felt how hot it was. What the actual fuck? Why was this necessary? The ocean was perfectly capable of stripping away dirt and sand.

But Stiles was curious—human food was amazing, so maybe, this was too. He unwrapped the shawl from around his waist and climbed carefully into the tub, clutching the sides because he still didn't trust his new legs to fully support him as he lowered himself into the water.

The warm water came almost all the way up his chest, and he sat there, tense, before his body slowly relaxed, and he slumped back, closing his eyes. The warmth seeped through his skin and down into his bones, melting all the emotion away from him, leaving behind only a quiet contentment. There wasn't heat like this to be found in the ocean. There were only the lukewarm surface waves after they'd sat beneath the sun for a few hours. He sank even deeper, until his head was submerged, and he let himself float there.

Ariel had left a slip of soap beside the tub, and he used that to scrub the salt and sand from his skin. It felt like scrubbing away his siren self. He wasn't sure whether or not he liked the sensation.

When the water began to cool, Stiles climbed out of the tub and found the pile of folded clothes Ariel had selected for him. The pants were baggy, thick and black, and the white shirt was of a lighter cotton material. The pants slipped on easily, cinching at the waist, and the legs were baggy enough that if Stiles stood still, they melded together almost like a siren's tail. He tried on the shirt next, but it grated on his skin, made his chest constrict, made his whole spine tense. He ripped the shirt off, shuddering.

A mirror sat on a small stand near the bathtub, and he examined himself in it. His eyes were still big and black, his skin pale, but his canines were only a bit pointy rather than all his teeth being long and sharp. His throat as one big, red, raw patch of scar tissue.

Stiles left the bathroom, feeling the chill of the air against his freshly heated skin. Ariel and Eric sat at the table, shucking peas. "No shirt?"

Stiles shook his head.

"Well, I can't say I'm complaining," Ariel said with a wink and a nervous laugh. Heat flooded Stiles' cheeks. "Come help us with these."

So Stiles sat down, took the bowl of peas that was handed to him, and started to pry the little green orbs from their pods, the repetitious act quiet and calming.

Derek's family thought he was dead. Of that, Derek was certain. The crew, undoubtedly, saw him go overboard, and everyone knew that the siren's song was a death sentence. Peter wouldn't bother to look for him, not wanting to risk the crew or the ship, and Peter never liked Derek much, anyways. No, his uncle would return to the Beacon Islands, tell Talia that Derek was dead, and watch as she set out on a crusade against siren kind, possibly hoping that the endeavor would get her killed and Peter would be able to assume the throne of Pirate King.

_(Part of him wondered if his mother would actually set off to avenge his supposed death or if she would just go on as usual.)_

Derek had been sitting on the beach for three hours, conch shell necklace in hand, staring out at the ocean as if hoping the siren would return. He was long gone by now, though. Seeing him again was just wishful thinking on Derek's part.

Sodden and cold, Derek dragged himself to his feet, his coat weighing heavy on his shoulders as he stuck the necklace in one pocket. Where the fuck was he? Derek didn't recognize the coastline, couldn't say how far the siren had pulled him—though it couldn't have been too far from the siren rock.

Derek needed supplies, and he needed a boat if he was going to make it back to the Beacon Islands. He could already picture his mother's face when he turned back up alive, having survived a siren attack. Maybe then she would finally believe in him, trust him with more duties.

After a few minutes of hunting, Derek found a small track leading into the woods, and so he followed it, his waterlogged shoes dragging his feet and making him stumble over the protruding roots and rocks. Fuck this walking shit. There was a reason pirates sailed everywhere.

A half hour or forty-five minutes or an eternity later, Derek finally broke out of the woods and stumbled onto a wide, dirt road, wagon wheel tracks marring the smooth surface. Derek had fifty bug bites, at least. His whole body itched unpleasantly.

He heard the sound of footsteps rumbling up the road behind him, and when he turned to watch the approach, he saw a woman in black livery, the eagle crest of the Golden Empire on her chest, riding towards him on a sleek, black horse, the plume on her helmet bouncing with every step. Derek stopped on the side of the road and clasped his hands in front of him to wait, a faint smile crawling on his face.

The soldier slowed as she approached him, face suspicious beneath the bill of her helmet, and Derek noticed her take in his long coat and the saber tucked into his red sash belt. He knew she was thinking 'pirate' and then wondering what he was doing so far from the sea.

"Hello," Derek said, taking a step forward, forcing her to slow up more. "I was hoping you could help me—I've been in a shipwreck."

"A shipwreck?" the woman repeated, her brow furrowed.

Derek gestured at the trees behind him. "On the beach just through the woods. We ran into some rocks. Couldn't see them because of the mist."

"Are there other survivors?" The soldier's need to help warred with her mistrust of Derek.

"Yes, but they're injured. They sent me to try and find help. Will you come?"

Chivalry obviously won because the soldier swung down from her horse, saying "Lead the way." As soon as her feet touched the ground, Derek lunged forward, seized the lapels of her tunic, and flung her into a tree. The woman cried out as she struck the the trunk with her back and then crashed to the ground, and Derek stalked towards her, drawing his sword. The curved blade made a whooshing sound as he swung it.

The soldier hauled herself upright, panting, one hand braced against the small of her back, but even with her face contorted in pain, she managed to draw her sword, a slim rapier with a rounded hilt.

She slashed at him first, but Derek used his thicker, heavier blade to smash hers aside, whipping the sword back up a second later to cut at her head. The soldier ducked and then stabbed, Derek deflecting and pressing forward so that the hilts of their swords locked together and they stood chest to chest. Derek pushed, forcing her back step after step, using his superior height and weight, until her back bumped up against a tree trunk. In one quick movement, he disengaged their swords and yanked his up so the heavy pommel cracked into her skull, and she fell like her strings had been cut.

Talia Hale would have killed the woman without a second thought, but to Derek, she hadn't done anything except be in the wrong place at the wrong time. That wasn't something she deserved to die for.

Derek did strip of her gold and spyglass. He had lost his when he went overboard. Then he swung up into her horse's saddle, set his heels to its sides, and set off down the road. His compass told him he was heading east, and the well-tended road informed him that he had to be nearby some kind of major town. In another hour, he was proven correct as he and his stolen horse stepped out of the trees and onto a cobblestoned street marching directly into the center of a large harbor town.

Smoke puffed out of the chimneys of the houses that were jam packed into every square inch of space, staining the sky grey-black, and Derek's nose twitched in disgust, used to the fresh scent of salt and the sea. People in dull, tattered clothing walked rapidly from place to place without looking at each other, making sure to give Derek and his horse plenty of room since they all they saw was the sleek, black lines of the animal, and they assumed it was that of an Empire soldier.

Derek moved deeper into the town, the horse's hooves click clacking on the cobblestones. Gangs of dirty men and women eyed him hungrily from the dark alleys, but Derek dropped his hand to the hilt of his saber and glared at them until they looked away. Squadrons of foot soldiers passed him, the butts of their spears thudding with every other step, but Derek ignored them and hoped they wouldn't notice that he was riding a stolen Empire horse.

He made it all the way to the docks without incident, sliding down from the horse and hitching it one of the posts under a open walled stable. Then he perched on a low stone wall to observe the ships currently docked. Logically, Derek needed a boat small enough to handle on his own, but a large schooner with a gleaming hull and brilliant white sails had caught his eye and wouldn't let it go. Workers buzzed along the deck and up the gangplank with crates and barrels of supplies, obviously preparing for a long journey. He wanted it. It would be a perfect addition to his mother's fleet.

Derek hopped to his feet. His clothing had finally finished drying, thank the seas, though all the salt caked on his skin was itchy enough to nearly drive him mad. Hands in his pockets, fingers running over the small conch shell, he sauntered towards the ramp to the docks, looking for all the world like he was just out for a leisurely walk, like he was meant to be there. Derek was one of those people who exuded a sense of authority. Maybe it was the dark hair, the stubble, and the sharp cheekbones. Maybe it was something his mother had given him.

Whatever it was it got him all the way down the docks, up the gangplank, and onto the ship. He just stuck his hands in his pockets and acted like he was inspecting things, and no one bothered to question him.

Lucky for him, the schooner was a merchant vessel rather than an Empire ship—he saw no uniforms on board, only a fat, sweaty man bellowing orders at the hired help. Derek grabbed an apple from a passing crate and leaned up against the railing to watch, his teeth crunching through the ruby red skin, tartness bursting across his tongue. He realized suddenly that he was ravenous and devoured the rest of the apple in three bites, chucking the core over his shoulder and into the water.

Ten minutes later, the crew finished stowing the last crate and began stowing the lines, moving briskly and efficiently. A few of them even gave Derek deferential nods as they walked past him.

"Cast off!" the merchant bellowed.

Derek watched, smirking softly, as the crew rushed in every direction to throw off the mooring lines, haul up the bumpers, and prepare the sails to be unfurled. He was like a rock in the current, the action flowing around him without touching him. The ship began to move, slipping swiftly and smoothly away from the docks as the rowers dipped their oars into the placid, grey water and began to pull. When they were far enough away, the oars were stowed, and the sailors let go of the ropes holding the sails in place, letting them snap out to catch the wind.

When they were far enough away that the docks couldn't be seen and the waters had nearly swallowed them, the coast line a smudge behind them, Derek moved, shoving himself up from his position leaning against the railing and making his way towards the captain, his hands in his pockets, the wind catching the ends of his black coat and whipping them around his ankles.

He approached the merchant captain from behind, slipping a small, stiletto knife from the hidden sheath inside the sleeve of his coat, and he poked the point of it into the man's side as he clapped the man on the shoulder, slinging his arm around the merchant's neck, the picture of a friendly greeting.

"Good day, Captain," Derek said. "You don't know me, but my name is Derek Hale."

The merchant stiffened at the sound of the Hale name.

"So you've heard of me. That's good." Derek dug the stiletto point in a little deeper, eliciting a squeak from the man. "I'm here to commandeer your vessel. It's nothing personal, really. I just have need of a ship. You're welcome to stay aboard, but you will be relinquishing your goods and crew to me."

"You're crazy," the captain hissed. His face was slick was sweat which was already starting to soak through his loose silk shirt. "I've hired a private security team for this voyage. They'll never allow you to get away with this."

Derek laughed. "I'm sure they'll see reason. You, on the other hand, have two options. You can either give up your ship to me willingly, or I can throw you overboard." He kept his voice light as he said it, making sure the two of them looked to all the world like old friends catching up.

"Do you have any idea how much money I've got invested in this trip? I can't just—!"

Derek knew where the man was going with that, so he silenced him by tossing him overboard, heaving the man backwards with enough force that he struck the railing and toppled over, yelling all the way. He hit the water with a splash.

The explosion of movement and sound caught the attention of the crew, and there was a long, frozen moment as they all just stared at Derek. Derek took full advantage of the time. He drew his sword and leapt atop a pile of barrels that hadn't been moved down into the hold yet, standing just so so that his coat lashed about in the wind.

"Hello, sailors of the…" He paused, then laughed a little sheepishly. "Well, shit. I forgot to actually look and see what this vessel's name was. How silly of me. You there." He pointed a one of the rowers. "What's she called?"

The man's voice cracked as he spoke. "The _Silver Sun_. Sir."

Derek turned the name over in his head. "Not a bad name. Might need changing, though. As it stands, the _Silver Sun_ is now under my control. None of you will be harmed so long as you obey. In fact, I'm sure you will find yourselves much richer if you follow me than you would if that fat merchant was still in charge."

His speech weeded out the bodyguards. Seven men and women, dressed in leather armor, broke out of the general crew and stalked towards him, most drawing short swords from their belts. One of them had a mace and another two, long daggers with hilts that clicked together to form a double-ended weapon.

Derek wasn't much of a fighter. He could swing a sword decently well, but he had never really taken to it in training like his mother or Peter had, yet he always seemed to be throwing himself into situations that required him to fight.

He drew his saber and pointed it towards the oncoming hired guards, tilting the blade so that the metal caught the sun just so and gleamed. "Is there any real need to fight? I promise I can pay you much more than whatever the merchant is giving you."

"It's a matter of honor," the woman at the front said, twirling her double bladed weapon in one hand. "If it got out that our loyalty could be bought so easily, no one would want to hire us any more."

Derek's eyes darted around the ship, searching for something that would give him a leg up in the oncoming fight.

Another bodyguard stepped forward and tugged on the leader's sleeve, leaning forward to whisper in her ear, though Derek could still hear the words. "Nadine, I think that's Derek Hale…"

"So what?" Nadine snapped. "He's still just one man, and there are seven of us."

Through a mixture of luck, cheap tricks, and a wild disregard for his own personal safety, Derek had inadvertently built up a reputation of a skilled and dangerous warrior. It was definitely going to get him killed one day.

Derek kicked a metal bucket that lay near his foot, sending it winging towards Nadine's head. She ducked, just like he thought she would, and the bucket nailed the man behind her right in the forehead. He crashed to the deck hard, taking the man with the mace with him. Derek leapt down the steps to the main deck just as Nadine straightened, and she came at him, twirling her weapon in dizzying circles, the blades blurring, but Derek grabbed a thick, coil of rope off the ground and flung it at her.

The four, razor sharp edges sliced through the tarred rope with ease, but the pieces continued to fly at her, one of them whacking her in the face and the others bombarding her torso.

"Ack!" The never-ending arc of her weapon faltered as she stumbled back. Her knees struck a barrel, and she tumbled over and hit the deck with a thud. Before Derek could capitalize, one of the other men came at him with a roar, and he barely yanked his sword up to block the other blade in time. The blow jarred his entire arm.

Three more strikes came in quick succession, nearly breaking through Derek's guard. The man was better than he was, and he found himself being driven back towards the railing. A line of pain scoured his face and the sword gotten a little too close.

Derek grabbed the bottom edge of his long coat when he had a moment of space and whipped it up towards his attacker's face, spinning and ducking along with the movement. The man yelped, startled, and as Derek completed the spin and drove his saber into the man's chest.

The man's face grew even more startled as Derek gave his sword a twist, blood trickling from his lips, and Derek let him slide off the blade and slump to the floor.

Nadine had regained her feet by the time Derek turned around, and all the remaining bodyguards were converging towards him, weapons drawn, faces furious. Derek darted to the side and grabbed a taunt rope securing one of the sails, slashing the bottom so that he was yanked up into the air. As he did, his foot knocked a glass jar over so that it shattered across the deck, releasing its white powdered contents into the air.

Derek missed what happened next. He heard Nadine yell, "Everyone get back!" But he was whizzing through the air too fast to make anything out. He conked his head on one of the beams supporting the sails, and he somehow got his arms around the beam as the rope zipped through his burning hands.

He dangled there, dizzy, feeling a little foolish, but when he looked down, the deck was in complete chaos. The white powder had spread, everyone was coughing, and the bodyguards had tripped over the rest of the crew in order to get away. The deck was a roiling mass of bodies, and as Derek watched, two of the bodyguards stumbled and pitched over the railing. The splash of them hitting the water was lost in the din of the shouting.

Derek's grip began to slip, slowly, implacably. _Ah, shit,_ he thought, and then it was too late to change anything.

Derek plummeted towards the deck and crashed onto something soft. He heard a grunt of pain and the crack of bones, and at first, he thought they were his own bones breaking, but when no throb of pain washed over him, he realized he'd landed on a bodyguard and broken his spine.

He rolled off the body with a grunt. He'd lost his saber somewhere along the way. Probably when the rope had first yanked him into the air. Hopefully, it hadn't gone overboard. Derek stumbled upright, every bone feeling like jelly, white powder all around him though the wind was already starting to blow it out to see. He coughed, throat burning.

With a murderous scream, Nadine came running towards him along with the final bodyguard, twirling her blade over her head, and Derek cursed. He searched for his saber and spotted it imbedded in the deck right by the railing, so he turned and sprinted towards it, leaping two unconscious bodies and then nearly face planting as his feet skidded through the pool of blood left by the first bodyguard he'd killed. He yanked the sword from the wood and turned just in time to bend over backwards and dodge a whistling blade.

"Motherfucker," he yelped in a voice that was just high enough to be embarrassing.

He stabbed the point of his blade into the railing and flung himself over so that one leg nailed Nadine in the chin, and his body swung across the hull in an arc, the tendons in his shoulder screaming. One of Nadine's weapons flashed perilously close his fingers.

Derek did not make all the way back onto the ship. He caught one leg on the railing, but the other one tangled awkwardly with his sheath and his coat, and he ended up dangling from the railing, stretched out to nearly his full height. The man with Nadine hacked at Derek's waist, forcing Derek to let go of his sword hilt, leaving him hanging upside down by one leg.

This was not going well.

But the wind shifted before the bodyguards could deliver the final blow. It was a sharp gust of wind, and none of the crew were manning the sails—they were all too wrapped up in watching this disaster of a fight unfold—and so the ship jerked to the side suddenly.

Nadine and the last bodyguard stumbled forward, unable to catch their balance and pitched over the railing, cursing and yelled. Nadine snatched at one of Derek's dangling hands, but he yanked it back before she could grab it, watching as the two hit the water one after another, the splashes barely audible. Nadine's head resurfaced a second later, but there was nothing on the ship for her to hold onto, and she floundered, weapon lost, waves slapping her in the face. Another second later, a dark shadow slide beneath her, and she disappeared from sight with a yelp.

Derek flailed a hand towards the railing, attempting to curl or swing himself back onto the deck, but he came up short, fingers clawing the air for purchase. Below him, the dark shadow circled back.

"Help, please," he said, trying to pretend like he was calm and not, in fact, freaking the fuck out. He had no idea if the crew would drag him back on board or just unhook his leg and leave him to whatever was lurking in the water.

He felt hands grab his leg, and panic flashed through him, certain that he was about to be pitched to his death, but instead, he was pulled up and over the railing, dumped in a heap on the deck.

Cheap tricks and dumb luck.

Derek didn't kiss the wood, as much as he was tempted to; instead, he climbed to his feet and shook out his coat, yanking his saber from the railing and holding it loosely in one hand. "Thanks for that," he said.

The crew of the _Silver Sun_ clustered around him, all of the staring with expressions ranging from awe to distrust to a wary admiration. The dead bodyguard lay in a pool of his own blood, a large berth around him, and the first guard that Derek had beaned with the bucket was still slumped over a pile of burlap sacks, unconscious. Derek strutted over to him, the crew parting before him, and drove the point of his saber into the man's heart. "Toss both of the bodies overboard," he ordered. "We don't want them stinking up our deck."

For a long moment, none of the crew moved. Derek glared around at them. "Do you all want to end up in the water as well?" he bellowed.

Several of the rowers leapt out of the crowd and seized the bodies, hobbling over to the rail to dispose of them.

"That's what I like to see." Derek jumped up onto a box so he could be better seen and heard. "Now, why don't you all say hello to the new captain of the _Empty Sun_." He thought that was the sort of ship name his mother would come up with. "If anyone has a problem with that, you know where the door is." He pointed towards the water and waited. When nobody moved, he nodded crisply. "Right then. Let's set sail for Beacon Islands, then."

Stiles had been with Ariel and Eric for two weeks, helping out anyway he could, though after he nearly burned down the kitchen while trying to help cook dinner, Ariel banned him from the stove, so he mostly just chopped wood, cleaned, and carried heavy things around.

Every night, he disappeared from the little cottage and made his way down to the forest path to the beach so he could sit and stare out at the ocean, the sound of the waves rolling in gently across the sand comforting to him. Ariel never asked him where he went or why. For that, he was grateful.

This particular night, he sat on a driftwood log with his elbows on his knees as he watched the sunset. He was thinking about that pirate he'd saved—the one with the cheekbones sharp enough to cut a bone on, the dark, dark hair, and the ever-shifting eye color. He wondered where the man was, what he was up to…if Stiles would ever see him again.

He felt his cheeks flame—another unfortunate side effect of his new, human form. Sirens never had to worry about blushing.

What was it King Argent had said—banished until Stiles retuned the life he had stolen? Stiles wanted his tail back. He missed the freedom of the ocean and how much of a dumbass Scott was, yet he couldn't imagine hunting the pirate down and bringing him to his doom.

He stood up. Maybe it was best just to accept the new life he had here. Surely, it was one he could be happy in.

Stiles retuned to the village to find it on fire. The thick trees had blocked out the glow of the flames, and the wind was the blowing the smoke away from him, leaving him clueless until he stumbled right into the middle of it. "Ariel!" he yelled as he burst out of the forest.

No sound came out.

He raced into the village, unseen voices screaming all around him, buildings on fire, men and women in leather stalking in every direction, brandishing jagged swords. As Stiles watched, one of them cut down Old Mrs. Jenkins, the town apothecary. Cut her down in the middle of the street. Didn't even blink as she screamed and her blood sprayed everywhere. Moved on to the next victim.

"Stop!" Ariel's voice rang through the smoke and the fire, clear as a bell. "Get away from him!"

Stiles took off after the sound, leaping a hedge and skidding around the corner of a building in time to see a quad of leather clad bandits stalking towards Ariel as she desperately tried to shield Eric with nothing more than her body. The lead bandit—a man with a beard almost down to his waist—lifted his rusted sword, preparing to strike.

Stiles lunged forward, glass-like fangs slipping from his mouth, black talons shooting out of his fingers. In the back of his head, he was glad that at least he still had a few of his siren abilities left. He jumped and landed on top of the bearded man's, driving his fangs deep into the exposed neck. Blood erupted in his mouth, hot and salty.

The bearded man screamed, but it quickly quieted down into a strangled gurgle. The two of them crumpled to the ground, and Stiles let go and rolled off the man, rising to a crouch and hissing at the other three bandits—or tried to hiss. It was probably just bared teeth. But bloody bared teeth were still an intimidating thing.

He stalked towards the bandits, and after a moment's hesitation, they brandished their swords and came to meet him. Stiles leapt forward and tore through the bandits like a whirlwind, his talons seeking soft flesh and vulnerable arteries, his limbs flowing like he was back in the water.

In an instant, it was all over, and he stood surrounded by fallen bodies and red pools. His face was sticky, and blood rolled down his cheeks and chest, dripped off his fingers, and stained his mouth. He panted, chest heaving, struggling to retract his fangs and talons. His adrenaline was running too high.

"Stiles?" Ariel's voice was hesitant, nervous.

Stiles turned slowly, almost against his own will. He didn't want her to see him like this, but she had already watched him rip four people apart.

She clapped her hands over her mouth. He knew what she was seeing. Black pit eyes. Ruby stained mouth. More blood splattered all up and down his chest.

"You're—what are you?"

But she already knew what he was. Stiles could see it in her eyes.

"You're a siren."

He nodded. He finally got his fangs and talons to retract. Too little too late.

"Your kind killed my husband."

Stiles nodded again. What else could he do?

"I don't understand. How do you have legs?" Ariel held Eric behind her with one hand. The little boy watched Stiles with terrified, tear-filled eyes, his lower lip trembling. It made Stiles want to cry himself. Ariel's expression hardened. "No, it doesn't matter. Just go. Get out of here."

"_Go?_" Stiles said soundlessly. But of course, this is how things would end. This is how things were always going to end. Humans and sirens didn't mix. And shouldn't mix.

Ariel pushed Eric back a few steps. "Yes. You should go. Now. Don't come back."

Stiles nodded. "_I'm sorry_."

But there were still bandits in the town. For some reason, Stiles couldn't leave them to terrorize the villagers, no matter what he thought of humans. He gave Ariel one last look as his fangs slid back out and his talons extended. Ariel gasped in fear. Stiles tried not to notice. He went on the attack instead.

He ghosted through the town like a shadow caught by the tail end of a lantern. One bandit disappeared just before he could cut a child in two, his scream cut off before it could even start as blood splattered the white washed wall of the cottage. A woman found herself suddenly separated from her head as it was twisted right off her neck. The next trio lost their intestines as talons from an unseen hand tore through their leather armor and their soft stomachs, blood spilling like a waterfall. One of them tried fruitlessly to put his guts back inside. He failed.

The last bandit, Stiles fell on from above, landing on the woman's back, digging his talons into her shoulders before she could shake him off. He bit deep into her neck, blood spurting down his throat, and she shrieked, slashing blindly at him with her short sword. He rode her to the ground, tearing out a chunk of her neck so that her arteries sprayed blood across his face.

Stiles stood. His face and chest were drenched in blood, and more of the tacky liquid matted his hair flat. When he looked around, all the surviving humans were staring at him, all with expressions of fear on their faces. Stiles stood with his spine straight. If they thought he was a monster, then that was what he was. He was fine with that.

Stiles walked out of the village with his head held high, returning to the forest and making his way down to the beach. He washed the blood off in the ocean, the salt stinging a large cut down his chest that he didn't remember getting. Then he sat down in the waves and let them wash over his legs, the sand shifting softly around him.

Too siren for the humans, and too human for the sirens.

Maybe he should just go find an ocean side cave somewhere and live there for the rest of his life.

Stiles stayed in the water until the sun began to rise, staining the sky and all the land a deep red like that Stiles had left behind in the village. Then he stood and set off down the beach, his pants dripping, his expression blank. He walked for several days. Stopping to sleep when he needed to. Collecting the rain water that fell when he was thirsty. Catching the fish in the shallows when he was hungry. The coastline turned from sand to rock, the hard stones hurting Stiles' bare feet. He didn't stop until he spotted a dark mouth in the cliffs that towered starkly above him.

He clambered into its damp, rocky depths. This seemed like the sort of place he deserved. Dark. Dripping. Filled with crabs with sharp claws. He settled down on a relatively flat slab of rock with his hands laced under his head and one foot propped up on the other knee.

Well. This was just great.

It took Derek and his high jacked ship a month to get back to Beacon Islands. It was a sunny, cloudless day when their lookout spotted the outline of the islands on the horizon and shouted the news down to him. There was no more animosity between him and the crew. These were people who accepted power, no matter who wielded it, so long as they got paid.

"Raise the flag," Derek bellowed, and the crew leapt to it, lifting the pitch black pirate flag up the mast. Derek had his own personal insignia, of course, but he wanted his entrance to be a bit more dramatic than just raising his flag for the whole island to see. The general black one would be enough to allow them into the harbor without getting shot at.

Derek had had cannons fired at him before. It was not a fun experience.

He spotted the _Silent Serpent_ docked in its usual place, beside his mother's ship, the _Shadowed Vale_. The spot that was reserved for his personal ship—if he ever got one—was empty, and Derek wondered if that was a sign that his mother was still grieving for him.

But Derek didn't head for that dock, still wanting to keep his presence hidden. Instead, he pointed to a side dock, one where visiting ships were allowed to moor for a few days before applying for a more permanent slip.

His crew docked the ship quickly and efficiently, and it wasn't long before the dock master was sauntering up the gang plank. Derek walked to meet her, the collar of his long coat popped up and his head tilted to the side to obscure his features a bit. He clasped the woman's hand and dropped a pouch of silver into it.

"Have a pleasant stay, sir," the woman said. The pouch disappeared into a vest pocket as she scribbled something on her clipboard and then walked off.

"You guys have fun in town," Derek calls to his crew. "You can have the silver that's left in your late captain's office."

A resounding cheer went up behind him as he hopped off the gang plank and onto the dock, a dull thud rising up from his boots. A shanty town spread out from the base of the docks—impossibly, it seemed to have grown from the last time Derek was there. Most of the buildings were made out of wood from the surrounding forest, but despite that fact, fires blazed in barrels on every street corner, smoke puffing out of many of the chimneys. The people who roamed the streets were all the disreputable sort—armed to the teeth and scruffy around the edges. Quite a few of them were drunk or on their way to being so, and Derek passed at least seven brawls as he walked along—he couldn't be entirely sure which ones were amiable and which ones were…less so.

The Hale residence was set on the top of a hill, just above the shanty town. Over the years, it had grown from a single room cabin into a sprawling, three floor, two wing mansion. Stolen gold had been melted down and worked into the pillars and walls as decoration, and carefully cultivated, exotic plant life led the way up to the front doors where two of Talia's hired mercenaries lounged against the walls.

As Derek came into view, the mercs straightened, hands dropping to their sword hilts. Derek tilted his head up so that the light from the torch fell on his face. "I'm here to see my mother."

"Who the fuck are you?" the man with a bulbous nose grunted.

"Ah, you must be new," Derek sighed. "My name is Derek Hale. I need to speak to my mother."

"Derek Hale is dead," the other merc said, a woman with a shaved head and black tattoos zig zagging across her scalp. "So I'll repeat my partner's question—who the fuck are you?"

"I'm Derek Hale," Derek said again despite the fact that he knew it was useless.

He kicked the torch stand, knocking the flames to the ground and setting off a chain reaction that somehow wound up with a potted plant falling on Frog Nose's head who then stumbled into Tattoos as she was just finishing up drawing her sword. She dropped the blade, impaled her own foot, bellowed in pain, and stumbled backwards so that she fell off the wooden porch and smacked her head on a rock.

"How the fuck…?" Derek muttered to himself. He decided not to question his weird luck and let himself into the mansion instead.

He put his hands in his pockets and strolled down the hall which was decorated with displays of his mother's piratic prowess. A vase from Vyono. Dridian carpets. Tratic weapons. An ornately carved chest from the Land of the Actyion.

The hall took him directly to his mother's throne room. No one guarded these doors so Derek threw them open and strode through, right up the black carpet to his mother's chair. She lounged there with Laura, Derek's sister, beside her and Peter whispering something in her ear.

"Hello, Mother," Derek said quietly. He didn't have to speak much above a conversational tone. The acoustics of the room carried his voice up to the throne perfectly well.

Talia Hale's head snapped up, her eyes instantly locking onto him as his sister's mouth dropped open. Peter's head turned more slowly, expression of surprise instantly masked by one of vague amusement.

"Surprise," Derek said. "I've come home."

"Derek!" His older sister leapt from the dais Talia's throne sat on and raced across the room to fling her arms around him. He barely pulled his hands from his pockets in time to catch her.

"I'm trying to do a dramatic thing here," he whispered in her ear.

Laura snorted but quickly let go to allow him to continue.

"Peter told me you died." Talia had always been good at modulating her voice. Derek could tell if she was pleased to see him or not.

"Guess I'm back."

Talia rolled her neck to look at Peter. "You told me he was dead."

"He was." Peter looked Derek over. "The sirens got him."

"Obviously not," Derek said, strolling closer to the throne. "Sorry it took me so long to get back, but I've brought you a ship and some new recruits for the cause."

"A new ship, really?" That finally sparked his mother's interest.

"A nice Empire vessel and everything."

A smile spread across her face, mostly made out of teeth. "Well, then, welcome back, my son."

"Hang on," Peter interrupted before things could get too touchy-feely. "How the hell did you survive? I saw you jump into the water. I watched those monsters drag you onto their rock."

"And yet you didn't try to save me," Derek tsked.

"There was nothing I could do." Peter spread his hands out. The gesture said 'so sorry.'

"That's alright. I forgive you," Derek said with a sweet, sweet smile on his face.

"How did you survive?" Peter reapeated, folding his arms.

Derek winked. "A man's got to have his secrets."

Peter opened his mouth to press the issue, but Talia lifted her hand to silence him. "That doesn't matter now. What matters is that my son has come home to me, and that is a call for celebration. Laura." Laura cocked an eyebrow and rejoined Talia on the dais. "Get the preparations started."

"Can it be a rager?" Laura asked with a gleam in her eyes that made Derek a little worried.

For the first time since his return, Talia's façade cracked, and she smiled fully, nodding. "Yes, it can be a rager."

Laura cheered and raced from the room, clapping Derek on the arm before she disappeared.

"Peter, go check on this ship and its crew, and see if you can't get them integrated into our little society."

"Yes, Talia." Peter gave her a short bow and headed for the doors. As he passed Derek, he slowed and gave Derek a glare verging on murderous, casually slamming his shoulder into Derek's, forcing Derek back a step.

"Dick," Derek muttered.

"Fuck up," Peter replied. He slammed the doors shut behind him.

Talia stood from her throne and spread her arms out. She was always a sight to behold—gold thread and other jewels woven through her hair, dark robes spilling over her leather armor, complemented by an iron pauldron and bracers engraved with serpents. "Come here, son. Give your mother a hug."

Derek wasn't sure what her play was, given that his mother didn't usually express affection physically or at all, but he couldn't resist the offer of a hug from his mother. She'd stopped given them out after she'd become the Pirate Queen. So he let her wrap his arms around him, and he sunk into that familiar scent of pinewood, gunpowder, and cinnamon from where she dabbed it on her neck.

"I thought you were dead," she whispered in his ear. "Don't ever do that to me again."

"I know, Mother. I'm sorry."

Talia released him from the hug but kept hold of his arms so that she could look him over, checking him for injuries. "How did you survive?" she asked.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

Talia accepted his answer—she of all people understood keeping secrets. "I kept your room the same. Go. Get some rest before the party. We'll talk more later."

Derek nodded and left the throne room, weaving through the familiar corridors until he came to his old room. His mother was telling the truth—it was exactly as he'd left it. The mattress dominated the center of the floor, covered in silk blankets and goose feather pillows, and shelves full of stolen books hid the walls. Peter always made fun of him for stealing books. His mother certainly didn't understand it either. But Derek liked the smell of them, the comforting weight of their leather spines in his hand. He liked that they held wonders and infinite possibilities.

Maybe in one of them, it would be possible for a human and siren to get along.

Derek flopped down on his bed. He'd been thinking a lot about that siren boy on his journey home. He'd taken to wearing the conch shell on a cord around his neck. The siren's eyes had been pitch black, yet they had glimmered at Derek as the the boy looked at him, as he laughed. There'd been something about his smile—even with the pointy teeth—that had caught itself on Derek's brain and now refused to dislodge.

But he knew he would never see the siren boy again. That would be like trying to find one specific fish in the sea.

A few hours later, he got up to attend his sister's welcome home party, though before he could open the doors to the great hall, she barreled through and practically threw him down the hallway. "What the hell are you doing?" she demanded.

"Uh, attending my party?"

Laura flung her hands in air. "You can't show up on time! Are you crazy?"

"Why not?"

"Just wait here for a half hour. I'll come get you and then you can make a proper entrance."

Laura disappeared back into the great hall before he could answer. Derek was pretty sure he heard her lock the doors. Derek sighed and leaned against the wall, hands stuck in his pockets and his head tipped back.

He was pretty sure Laura kept him waiting for longer than thirty minutes before she finally came to collect him. "Alright, you're going to throw the doors open as hard as you can and strut right on up to the head of the table."

"Strut?" Derek asked dubiously.

"Yes, strut. It shouldn't be hard for you. You're already a straight up drama queen." Laura fixed him with a hard gaze. "If I don't see proper strutting we will have words."

"I'd hardly say I was a _straight_ up drama queen," Derek protested with a grin.

"Touché. Now get your ass in there."

Laura slapped him in the ass to prove her point.

So Derek did as he was told. He flung the doors open, and Laura had obviously made sure they were well oiled, because they flew open hard and fast enough to slam against the walls. Derek was lucky they didn't rebound into his face. He strode into the room, a breeze from somewhere making the tails of his coat flap. Derek honestly had no clue how Laura pulled this kind of shit off.

All eyes turned to him, and the band in the corner struck up a song just for him, a dramatic and flourishing tune. The room was decorated with candles and spools of black silk, and people filled the long wooden tables that lined the walk up to the high table where Talia and Peter sat, the big chair in the center empty and reserved for him.

Derek sauntered towards it, keeping his chin tilted up and his eyes straight forward without acknowledging the cheers and applause that went up at his entrance. He mounted the stairs up to the high table, and when he reached his chair, he finally faced the crowd and raised a hand in greeting. The applause grew until it was echoing off the rafters.

Talia stood and lifted a glass, and the assembled pirates fell completely silent. It was an impressive feat. A room full of pirates and criminals was nigh on impossible to silence. "On this great day, my son, Derek, has returned to us from the cold, cruel seas which took him from us."

Derek rolled his eyes. His mother could be so dramatic sometimes.

He supposed he had to get it from somewhere.

"When Peter returned a few weeks ago and told me that sirens had killed my son, I was devastated, absolutely wrecked. I couldn't get out of bed for days, isn't that right, Peter." Peter smiles in confirmation. In the right light, it could look amused. "But now, like a miracle from the Sea God himself, here he is." Talia grasped Derek's shoulder. "My boy. And to mark this occasion, I am pleased to make Derek the captain of the _Empty Sun_—the very ship he returned to us on." From a pouch on her belt, she drew a golden chain from which dangled a ship shaped pendant—the same one that all pirate captains wore.

Talia let it spill into Derek's outstretched palm, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek. "Thank you," Derek murmured.

"You deserve it."

"And this I swear," Talia raised her voice again and turned back to the crowd. "For the crime of daring to try and take my son from me, I will hunt down each and every siren that prowls these waters, and I will wipe them off the map!"

Derek's stomach turned cold and sank as the pirates in the room roared their approval.

"But for now, let us celebrate!" Talia lifted her glass and downed it in one go, and this time, the pirates pounded their own cups against the tables and got to drinking.

Derek blacked out. He thought it was around the sixth drink, but he couldn't be sure. People just kept handing cups to him. He woke up the next morning with a splitting headache, a sour taste in his mouth, and a dark haired man he didn't totally recognize in bed beside him. Derek blinked blearily down at the back of the man's head. Neither of them were wearing shirts—or any other clothes, Derek realized.

He rolled out of bed—his head screaming at him to just fucking stop—and found his discarded pants, staggering to the chamber pot to relieve the unbearable pressure on his bladder. Then he pulled on a shirt and left, hoping the unknown man would take his absence as a cue to leave when he woke up.

Derek stumbled down to the kitchens, slipping in and out to grab some food before one of the cooks could spot him and proceed to ask a series of very loud questions that would make his head break. Bread and bacon in hand, he made his way outside to the cliff peak out back of the Hale house which overlooked a long stretch of unbroken ocean. He sat down cross-legged, though the grass was still a bit damp with dew.

He took the conch shell necklace from his pocket and let it dangle from his fingers so that the early morning sunlight brought out its hidden colors. Something, somewhere, out in the ocean called to him, whispering out from the hollow mouth of the shell.

Time passed. Stiles had no way to tell how much. Day and night switched places again and again. Rain came. Rain left. Storms blew water into his cave, and he watched it seep out again in rivulets. Temperatures rose and fell, and he saw humans pass by outside his cave, but whenever one came to close, he hissed loudly from within the shadows until they ran away, faces contorted with fear. When he grew hungry, he pulled fish from the ocean. He ate them raw, trying not to remember the delicious food he had with Ariel and Eric.

Their faces came to him at night, curdled with horror at what he was. So he stopped sleeping so much, catching a few winks only when his tired eyes forced him to. Most nights he spent out at the water, letting the waves lap over his toes, dreaming of throwing himself to its mercy. He missed being able to carve a powerful path through the depths, missed the undulating darkness, missed the freedom of the waves.

All that had been torn from him…

He bellowed at the sky, head tipped back, hands clenched in fists at his side so that blood dripped to the sand. Of course, no sound came out.

Why had he done that? Why had he saved that damned pirate from his king's clutches? It had been stupid, foolhardy, had cost him everything.

And yet he would not hunt down that pirate like his king had instructed, would not bring the man to the Home Rock to be torn apart as dinner.

So Stiles was left in stasis. As the days passed, he coaxed leafy plants to grow from the cliff face and cover up the entrance to his cave, obscuring it from the view of any passing humans. He listened to them talk on the rare occasions that they came by, and though he wouldn't admit it, he was waiting to hear word about his pirate. One day, a pair of resting merchant sailors gave him exactly what he was listening for.

"Our jobs is so much easier now that we don't have to worry about them Hale pirates anymore," one of them said, a man who sounded like he had gravel in his throat.

"More boring, though," a woman said, her tone so musical that Stiles immediately grew jealous. He moved silently across his cave to sit on a rock beside the thick tangle of leaves.

"Naw, I'll take this over fight them bastards off any day."

"Why did she call off the raids?"

"Rumor is she's off hunting sirens. Her son was almost killed by some a few months past."

"The great Derek Hale almost killed by sirens?" Music laughed, the sound mocking. "Not likely."

_Derek Hale. _Stiles tried out the name, liking the way it felt on his lips.

"That's what they say. Apparently, she won't rest until ever single siren in these waters is dead."

"Then let's hope she never finds them all."

The two humans shared a laugh, and Stiles heard them gather up their things and then move off down the beach.

Derek Hale. Of course Stiles knew of the Hale pirates. The sirens lived _on_ a rock, not under one. Storms, the fact that he was a pirate made Derek even more attractive to Stiles; they were both abhorred by the average human. Derek hadn't looked at Stiles with hatred or fear in his eyes. Maybe Stiles should go try to find him.

But…that would require Stiles to go back out into the world and walk among the humans, to be attacked and feared and hated, and inevitably tossed out on his ass. Stiles didn't want to go through all that again. He couldn't.

So he stayed in his cave. He hid himself away. And he pretended he was fine with it.

The temperature dropped steadily as the days went by. Time was, Stiles could withstand extreme cold—a siren had to, living in the depths of the ocean—but in this frailer, human body soon began to shiver and shudder, bumps rising up all along his skin. The fact that he had no shirt or shoes certainly didn't help.

So one day, Stiles slipped out of his cave and onto the beach where the sand was slick with ice. The sky was grey and heavy overhead, and the ocean seemed angry, thrashing against the shore while wind whipped up and down the beach, breaking itself against the cliffs. It was the kind of day you either spent wholly on the Home Rock or wholly deep beneath the waves where the currents had less pull.

Stiles knew from listening to the humans that there was a village on top of the cliffs, set a little way into the woods. A steep stone path carved into the rock took him up away from his cave, the cold numbing his feet. He climbed until his legs began to ache, and he had nearly slipped off the cliff face and plummeted to his death on five separate occasions. He really hated having legs and walking everywhere.

Stiles ghosted through the trees like a wraith, mist wrapping around him, and he stopped on the periphery of the village, watching. It was a quiet sort of place, most of the villagers sequestered away in their cottages to hide from the storm brewing in the air. There were no clothes out on lines for him to easily steal, so he was forced to move deeper into the village until he found a house that appeared dark and empty.

He used his shoulder to break the lock and force his way inside. The room on the other side was cluttered and messy, clothes strewn everywhere, and dirty dishes piled high in the bin. The stagnant smell of it all made his nose twitch and wish to retreat back into his face. He nudged his way through the cluttered kitchen and searched through the infinite piles until he found a woolen tunic that looked like it had been cleaned, folded, and left on top of a cabinet for several months.

Pulling it over his head was like allowing sucker-stalk seaweed to drag him down into the deepest, darkest depths.

He shuddered, struggling to keep himself from tearing the sweater off again, skin crawling, spine tingling. In a rack shoved haphazardly into a corner, he found a pair of worn, leather boots, speckled with mud. He slipped his feet into them. And almost immediately collapsed. It felt like he had dropped boulders on his feet or gotten them trapped in pressure-filled, deep sea trenches.

Using the wall for support, he dragged himself upright, the weight of the shoes so unnatural that he wondered if he would even be able to pick his feet up to take a step. Before he could try, however, the door banged open, letting in a gust of cold wind and a staggering figure in a ragged clock and a shapeless hat. Stiles froze in place, trying to be invisible against the wall, but the figure looked up, perhaps sensing a disturbance in the usually familiar atmosphere of home, and pinned Stiles to the wall with his eyes, though his gaze was a little unfocused and his cheeks a ruddy red.

Stiles should not have done what he did next.

But he had been scorned and spat at and feared and even attacked, and so his old siren instincts had taken over his newer amnesty towards humans, and darkness bled into his eyes, talons from his fingers, teeth from his mouth.

There was just enough light struggling through the clouds and the grimy windows to allow the ragged man to see this shift.

"Monster!" he bellowed out the door, but rather than fleeing the house, he swept a cleaver off the nearby kitchen island and flung it a little haphazardly towards Stiles. His aim was wildly off, the knife thunking into the couch three feet to Stiles' left—lucky, since the boots were lead manacles around his feet.

He ripped free of the prisons and launched himself at the ragged man, hissing through his pointed teeth. Within a second, he was close enough to see the human's eyes widen in fear, and then he lashed out, talons shredding cloth, shredding flesh, shedding blood. He tried not to kill the human, holding onto some small hope that he wasn't a total monster, but he was sure he succeeded as the ragged man screamed and pain and collapsed, twitching, clutching, bleeding, crying.

Stiles leapt over him, out into the village where humans are streaming from their homes, brandishing torches and pitchforks and strips of metal that might, in a certain light, be construed as short swords.

Stiles' sharp ears picked up on some of the vibrations their murmurings made.

"_That's the monster…"_

"…_the siren…"_

"…_murdered a kid…"_

"…_beast…"_

"…_abomination…"_

"…_demon…."_

"…_let's kill him…"_

Monster, eh? Fine. No point fighting it any longer. If the humans wanted a monster, they would get a monster.

The siren slowly peeled the woolen tunic off and tossed it to the side; it would be easy enough to recover it and take whenever else the siren wanted after it dealt with all these humans. Its tattoos gleamed in the torchlight, thick and black against the pale, pale skin, the black-black eyes in the skull-like face drawing in the light, eating it, extinguishing it.

If only the siren had its voice; it would make these humans welcome death with open arms, smiles on their faces, but as it stood, the siren would have to do things the hard way. It was fine with that. It was a monster, after all. It wanted to feel blood on its talons and flesh in between its teeth.

Its king was right. Humans were only good for food and sport.

Maybe after this, it would go hunt down that human pirate—after all, why did it deserve to live anymore than these other humans?

_(A small part of the siren shied away from this, attempted to push through the darkness of the monster and into the light, only to be shunted back down into the murky depths and the cloying, tentacle-fingered mud)._

The humans roared their anger and their hate and ran at the siren, brandishing weapons and torches, and the siren, though it wasn't built for two legs or land, flowed between them, like water through rocks. Talons lashed out, parting skin like algae, and the angry bellowing quickly turned to pained and horrified screaming.

One human got close enough to thrust her pitchfork at the siren's face, but the monster batted it to the side and leapt forward, wrapping its longer legs around her waist and its strong arms around her shoulders, burying its sharp, sharp teeth in her neck, biting down so that hot blood, like iron and fat and life, spurted into its mouth, rushed down its throat, spilled down its front.

It bore the human to the ground and jumped off, tackling another, eviscerating him, then ducked under a sloppy sword swing, hamstrung the man, and bounded off the wall of a house to land on the shoulders of the tallest human. The human flailed, but his pitchfork hadn't the dexterity to reach the siren up there. A talon to the spine and a quick slice took care of him. He toppled like a heavy stone splashing into the ocean.

The final two humans attacked the siren at once, one woman scooping up a hammered iron sword from a body and the other brandishing the one she already had. The siren grinned, baring teeth, bloodlust rising high, saliva erupting across its tongue, desperate for the taste of human flesh, human blood, human bone—the marrow hardest to get but the most delicious…

_(it had a name, part of its brain tried to remind it, a name to make it more of a person, less of a monster, less of a _thing_ to be gouged from the surface of the world)_

The fight was over so quickly that the siren almost didn't taste it. The shredded remains of the humans lay on the ground before the siren, mangled heaps of flesh that were hardly recognizable as women. The entire village fell silent but for the rasping of the siren's breath, and its ears picked up the sound of drumming hoof beats—some human gone to get help or perhaps passing travelers come to investigate the sharp screams.

It left.

Slinking back to the forest and down to its beach, its cave, leaving the boots and tunic behind.

Monsters didn't wear clothes.

The conch shell had gone silent.

Derek Hale finally had command of his own ship, with no Peter aboard to undermine his authority. Talia sent him on ahead of the main fleet to serve as scout and find the exact location of siren's home rock, but Derek had been following the call of the conch instead, hoping it would lead him to the siren who'd saved his life.

He'd been following the whispering for four days, but this morning, all of a sudden, the necklace had ceased to sing, and Derek's stomach clenched with worry. But he refused to show that to his crew lest they chew him up and spit him out. He kept them on a course straight ahead. It was the only thing he could think to do.

A week later, they made landfall at a small port on a landmass to the east of the Hales' island. Derek watched the customs agent scurry nervously towards their gangplank. The _Empty Sun _flew a simple merchant's flag, but the whole town knew what they truly were. It was hard to hide the the wolf's head figure that marked all of the Hale ships. The _Silent Serpent's_ was the most impressive, snarling and jagged-toothed, a severed arm stuck between its incisors. The figurehead of the _Empty Sun_, on the other hand, howled up on the moon, something forlorn in its obsidian eyes and the wet tracks of its fur.

But they flew the merchant's flag and had done nothing to provoke the town, and so the customs agent had no choice but to sidle up the gangplank, clutching a clipboard to her chest as if that would be any kind of protection if Derek decided to actually live up to his namesake.

Instead, he dropped lightly to the main deck, long cloak flapping, and sauntered up to her. "What can I do for you?" he asked politely as she took an involuntary step away from him.

She cleared her throat and shuffled through her papers. "Inspection," she said and managed to keep most of the squeak out of her voice.

"Be my guest." Derek gestured up the gangplank. "My first mate can give you our manifesto."

The inspector scurried onto the ship and towards the man Derek pointed out, nervously eyeing every member of the crew. Derek watched, crunching into an apple pulled from his pocket, as the first mate gave the inspector the runaround and eventually escorted her off the ship with a jingling bag of gold in her hand.

"Have fun," he called to his crew. "Be ready to leave in three days. I have some business to attend to."

"What are we doing here?" his first mate asked, staying behind as the rest of the pirates practically fought to be the first off the ship.

"I've got a lead on the sirens that I want to look into. A contact from when, you know, everyone thought I was dead."

"Do you need help?"

Considering that he didn't really know what the lead was or what he was doing in this town, no. He shook his head and clapped the first mate on the shoulder. "Go have a few drinks for me."

The pirate couldn't contain his grin as he hurried off the ship and disappeared into the town.

Derek sighed and let his captain's mask drop now that he was alone. What in the sun's name was he doing here? He bounced the conch shell in his palm as he walked down the gangplank, hoping it would come to life again and tell him where he was supposed to go, but it remained lifeless.

He wandered down cobblestone streets, past houses made of the same material, all surprisingly clean considering he was still in the docks district where the less savory members of the city's populace tended to roam. He wound up outside a tavern called the Oily Lantern. He knew taverns were usually held a wealth of information, and it was the only place he could think to go.

He slipped through the door as quietly as he could so that he would be able to sit in the shadows and listen to all the conversations around him without anyone taking notice of him. He bought a drink first, of course. Camouflage. He settled into a back corner at a small, empty table and breathed out slowly, allowing his hearing to expand, filter though all the voices coming towards him.

Most of it was about the storm expected to hit town in the next two days. Port town people always liked to talk about the weather. One table was bitching about the rich folk up the hill. Another seemed to be planning some kind of heist on the local money lender. Their plan had three different holes in it, but Derek didn't have time to help them fix it. The next table over was debating how to properly cook—

"I _swear_ I saw it."

A sharper, louder exclamation broke through the din and caught Derek's attention. He tilted his ear towards it.

"No, you didn't," the second person at the table scoffed, a young woman with black hair bound in an elaborate braid crown wrapped around her head. She stared at her companion with a mixture of adoration and mocking scorn in her eyes.

The other woman wore a half open vest over an equally half open shirt and sat splayed in her seat like she own the place. At her friend's words, she sat up and leaned forward, gesturing emphatically. "I did. I saw the Beast. I was hunting crabs down on Racker Beach. It was in the cave there."

"The Beast is just a tall tale some dick invented to screw with people. Maybe protect some kind of stash."

"It had black eyes and weird tattoos," the woman in the vest insisted, gesturing up one arm.

Derek's heart stuttered for a second. Black eyes. Black tattoos.

He stood up so quickly he knocked his half-full mug to the floor. The thud it made cut through the chatter and drew the attention of the whole bar to him. The two women stared at him, blinking, as he stood, frozen, in an awkward, bent over position.

"…Hey," he said, picked up his glass to put it back on the table, and then sidled out of the tavern.

Talia Hale would have swept out, imperious look in her eye, but the confidence trait seemed to have skipped over Derek. His swagger was all false.

Racker Beach…he'd seen that name on one of his sea charts. It was just east of town. He didn't steal a horse this time, since the ship was flying a merchant's flag. He rented one for the day. Like a normal, respectable person. It made his mouth taste sour.

Two hours later he was on the beach, tying his horse to a tree. Racker Beach was a sad affair, a mile-long stretch of wet, dirty sand bound by the grey washed sea and dark, snaggle-toothed cliffs.

The Beast, the woman said. Capital B Beast, as if big and bad and, well, beastly, but that didn't match the siren Derek met. The kid with the bright smile and the flippant goodbye.

One hand on the pommel of his sword, he walked down the beach, one eye on the black cliffs. It had started to rain just as he arrived, and the heavy mist quickly began to weigh on the shoulders of his coat and flatten the spike of his hair.

He spotted the razor tooth mouth of a cave about halfway down the beach, though it was too full of shadows to see inside as he stood at the opening. The wind made a faint whistling sound as it passed in and out of the cave, but he could hear no other sounds of movement.

Derek stooped and found a mostly dry stake of driftwood hidden under the slope of a fallen boulder and pulled his torch making kit from beneath his coat. Inside was a scrap of cloth, a small pot of oil, and a flint, all of which he used to quickly light the torch. Then he held the fire high and stepped into the cave.

Cursed fire, burning bright, intruding roughly, rudely, upon the siren's cave, hurting, hard on its eyes. The siren hissed silently, scuttling backwards, deeper into the shadows, until its back was pressed up against hard rock. There was a figure, outlined by the cursed flames, entering the siren's cave, trespassing on its territory.

So long in the dark had turned the light to a weapon against the siren, but that didn't mean it wouldn't defend what was its, so the siren shot forward, running on all fours, leaping through the air at the intruder. A hand caught its arm, hot as fire on the torch, and the siren found itself through out of the cave, onto the beach, sand scouring down its back, rain splattering its skin.

The siren flipped and rolled, talons digging into sand to bring it to a stop. Its head snapped up, fangs bared, black eyes dark and narrowed. A man stood before the siren, tall and wrapped in a long coat. There was something in his features—

_(the man on the beach, the man from the boat and the rock—)_

—the man who stole the siren's voice.

The torch illuminated the man's high cheekbones and dark hair, as well as his surprised expression. Though he held onto his sword there was hesitation in his eyes. "You…" he said.

The siren snapped its teeth and lunged. There was weakness in his eyes, and the siren was going to take advantage of that. But there was a flash of pain across its chest, and it fell back, dark blood dripping from a line scoured down its chest.

"Hey, stop, I don't want to hurt you," the man said, pleaded, really. "Don't you remember me? You saved my life."

That didn't sound right. Why would the siren ever save a human? Humans were food. Humans slaughtered other sirens. How many sirens had _this_ human killed?

It lunged again, leaping high, only to get a pommel to the stomach, all air knocked from the lungs, sand ground into the back once again. "Stop—" Of course, the siren wasn't going to stop. This siren had stolen its voice—if the siren brought him back to the king…

But the human had brought other hunters with to slaughter the monster. A mob of them came out of the forest just before the siren could make another move. Torches, even a pitchfork, though most of them held swords and crossbows. The siren snarled and flared its claws. It had killed this many before. It could kill this many again.

But the man did something strange.

He stepped in front of the siren. He spread out his hands, one of them holding his sword loosely. The siren cocked its head to the side, confused.

_(Another version of the siren had done the same, stepping in between the human and one of the siren's own kind)._

"There it is," one of the humans down the beach yelled, pointing with her sword. "Time to end this."

"Don't come any closer," the man in front of the siren ordered.

This was the siren's chance. The man was distracted. It could knock him out. Kill him. Carry him off to the Home Rock in exchange for a voice. But the siren didn't move. Didn't attack. There was something about this man.

"Are you protecting this thing?" the woman demands. The mob continued to move towards them, growls rumbling in every throat.

"Do you know how I am?"

The human snorted. She was only ten feet from the siren now, and her posse had finally stopped, bristling with weaponry. "I don't care."

"I'm Derek Hale."

The blood drained from the woman's face at the name, though some of the people behind her look confused, unfamiliar with the name. The siren searched its memories for its own knowledge of this Derek Hale. A pirate, slaughterer of its kind. Again, it should end things, take this Derek Hale out, bring him own to the king.

But the monster in the siren is flickering, remembering grabbing this pirate by the leg, dragging him off the rock, all the way to safety. Losing everything for this man. Why in Poseidon's name would it—he—do that?

And why would this man risk everything to protect a monster?

"There's only two of them," a human said to the one in charge.

Apparently Derek Hale had a reputation that proceeded them because the woman hesitated, working her jaw in thought.

Derek Hale glanced over his shoulder at the siren and smiled gently. "I've been looking everywhere for you."

The siren just cocked its head.

"You saved my life. I wanted to thank you."

The breath in the siren's lungs stopped, and a lot of things happened all at once. Someone exploded out of the back of the humans' ranks, firing a crossbow that went just wide of the Hale's head, acting as a signal for all the others to attack as well. Hale took one step, tripped, and barrel rolled right into the humans, knocking three over like pins.

The siren launched himself to the clumsy man's aid, though it seemed like he didn't need to. Hale had somehow regained his feet along with a crossbow which he fired at the lead woman, missed, and somehow hit a weak point in the cliff which started a miniature avalanche that mowed down half the mob. The siren stood back and blinked as everything devolved into chaos. Swords missed Hale and his flapping coat by inches. Crossbow bolts zipped right past him. Hale barely had to lift his blade—sometimes he even seemed to struggle to block blows—and yet human after human fell before him until it was just the two of them and the mob's leader.

"You really are supernatural," the woman murmured, shock and awe in her voice.

Hale shrugged. "'Tis a gift."

Gift the siren's ass. Somehow that man had more luck than a genie on a Tuesday.

"Why are you protecting that _thing_?" The woman jabbed her sword in the siren's direction.

Hale shrugged. "He saved my life."

"He's a mons—" She was dead before she could finish the word.

Hale, splattered in blood and coated in sand, turned to face the siren, sword slipping from his fingers. "Hey," he said.

The siren backed away, crouched, tense, waiting for the dark side of the coin to land face up, waiting for the cruel joke this man was no doubt enacting.

"It's okay." Hale held up both hands, smiled. "I won't hurt you."

But that was all humans did.

"My name is Derek Hale. What's yours?"

The siren hesitated, eyes darting from side to side, searching for the trap, but Hale didn't move, just stayed ten feet away and smiled faintly. The siren, he remembered seeing this man for the first time, feeling some sort of tug dragging the two of them together until he couldn't help but pull Hale off the Home Rock.

He couldn't smile, couldn't speak, but he crouched and wrote one word in the sand, then stepped back so that Hale could read it.

STILES.


End file.
